Indonesia's Rupiah Is Outperforming Every Major Currency
- Currency's 5.6% gain since Sept. 30 best among 31 currencies
- Aberdeen says rupiah resilience has been a `pleasant surprise'
A fruit vendor counts various Indonesian rupiah banknotes at his market stall in Jakarta, Indonesia, on Wednesday, June 18, 2014. The parliament budget commission approved a revised 2014 budget deficit of 2.4 percent of gross domestic product, Chairman Ahmadi Noor Supit said in Jakarta on June 18.
Photographer: Dimas Ardian/BloombergThe Indonesian rupiah’s world-beating rally in the past four months shows how a steady hand at the tiller can guide a developing nation through global turbulence.
The currency strengthened 5.6 percent from Sept. 30 through Thursday, a percentage point more than the Malaysian ringgit, the next-best performer among 31 major counterparts. That’s a far cry from the previous three years when the rupiah plunged 35 percent amid falling commodity prices, a slowing Chinese economy and anticipation of tighter U.S. monetary policy.